


Just Walk With Me

by printers_devil



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Children, F/F, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, Happy Ending, Implied Sexual Content, Married Couple, Melancholy, Post-Canon, Retirement
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:53:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26940940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/printers_devil/pseuds/printers_devil
Summary: Edelgard and Byleth take their well-deserved retirement, in a house in the country, with a river and a garden. Byleth has some trouble settling in. They get a little help from their friends.
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg/My Unit | Byleth
Comments: 5
Kudos: 52





	Just Walk With Me

**Author's Note:**

> This was a short, last-minute pinch hit for the Edeleth Big Bang, or, well, it was going to be. C'est la guerre. It seemed like a waste not to post it after all that work. 
> 
> Because this was going to be a pinch hit, I worked off someone else's outline for it, and you know what, post-canon marrieds fluff-with-a-teaspoon-of-angst is very much outside my comfort zone... but I had a great time doing it! Also, there is established Ferdibert in this, but I don't tag pairings if they're not the focus of the story. (Also, a light shaking of Dorogrid. Dorogrid rights.)

The Emperor's bedchambers were the size of some houses Byleth had stayed in when she was on the road as a child. The windows were stained glass, floor to ceiling; the floor was an intricate mosaic, which had always seemed useless to Byleth, because it was freezing in the winter and always covered by carpets, anyway.

The entire place was a wreck, right now. They were leaving the palace forever tomorrow. This was it.

Byleth had nothing to pack but the same little bag she'd carried all her life. Sometimes she had more things, sometimes she had fewer, but she took care to never own an object so precious that she couldn't leave it behind.

Edelgard, however, fussed. Of all the little trinkets to get hung up on, she was hung up on the horns. "They were ridiculous," Edelgard said, holding one in each hand. "I don't know what I was thinking, they were such a bother to put in my hair—" 

"You looked nice in them. You look nice in everything," Byleth said. It was true. "You also look nice in nothing." Also very true. "Leave them if you hate them, take them if you like them." 

Edelgard sat on the book-strewn ruin of her bed, her lavender skirts poufing out around her. The past eight years had whittled her down like a stick, turned her translucent, like a thin sheet of porcelain. Thirteen, fourteen long years since they'd met, though Byleth had missed five of those.

"You're right, of course... I won a war in these ridiculous things," Edelgard said, "I killed—well." 

"Dimitri. You killed Dimitri in them, and Claude, too, and a lot of your former classmates. It was a long time ago." 

Edelgard winced. 

Eight years, and Byleth was not used to it when her heart skipped a beat, sped up. Manuela—apprised of the full situation, sworn to the greatest secrecy—had once told Byleth that it might help her to name the emotions she was feeling, rather than trying to ignore them. This emotion was _You said the wrong thing when once you might have kept your mouth shut and said nothing at all, which would have been the smart thing to do,_ one of the less fun ones. 

"My teacher... you're right, of course." Edelgard looked past Byleth, out at the neat row of trunks near the door, already packed. She'd insisted on doing it herself, with no help from the servants. "I shouldn't be so sentimental." 

_Say the right thing, say the right thing—_ "Take them," Byleth said. "They'll remind us how we got to now. Who suffered, who died." 

"Ah, how bittersweet." 

"And of how much good you've done, too." 

That made Edelgard perk up. Byleth, who had never really had an official position in the Imperial government apart from "symbol of the Church of Seiros's downfall, and also the reason why the Emperor won't marry any of your sons or daughters, sorry," was pretty sure the Empire was better off now. She'd delivered the speeches Ferdinand put before her with as much feeling as she could muster, and traveled along with Hubert killing Agarthans, which she'd liked better. (There had been a long, ugly battle in an underground city. Now it was over.) Dorothea seemed to approve of the things Edelgard was doing, which was as good a weathervane as any. 

"Enough of this—the house," Edelgard said, tucking the horns away in their velvet-lined case. "It has a garden. Tell me, what should we plant?" 

Byleth considered this. Edelgard liked carnations. "Carnations."

"Ah... that's what I'll want to plant, and lavender, and roses. What do _you_ want to plant? You can have whatever you like."

They weren't leaving Enbarr to take vows of poverty, that much was for sure. "Turnips and cabbages," Byleth said, "and carrots. And beans. Lots of beans." 

Edelgard reached out to take both of Byleth's hands gently in hers. "Even after all this time, you surprise me. You want a vegetable garden?"

"I want to be able to pull my own turnips out of the ground and eat them," Byleth said, and Edelgard looked quizzically up at her, as though she'd said something strange. You peeled the skin off them with a knife and ate them raw. They tasted good. "Turnips are good with fish, too, and Hubert said there would be fishing." 

"I gave him very specific criteria for our home, yes." 

Oh, there went another emotion. _Our home_. The palace was just a big, fancy box. Byleth had always been happier in tents and dirty inns than she was here, in this place that reminded Edelgard of how much and how many people she'd lost.

"We're going to have to break in a new bed," Byleth said. "We should give this one a send-off." 

"My teacher is ever wise," said Edelgard, and unbuckled Byleth's belt for her.

-

The house itself was a small manor house by Edelgard's standards, and a mansion by Byleth's. The walls were washed a pale green on the outside, and they had a cook and a maid-of-all-work who came around every other day and lived in the village nearby.

Edelgard woke up every day with the sunrise to break her fast on their veranda, dressed in loose, pastel gowns. She took up painting with a lot of enthusiasm and little skill.Byleth fished, took long walks in the forest, and avoided their neighbors at all costs. They broke in the bed, and most of the surfaces in the house, as well. Edelgard's appetite for her had never wavered.

It took exactly two months for Byleth to get restless. There was nothing Edelgard seemed to _need,_ not so far—for the first time in their lives together, Edelgard seemed at peace. Nothing to worry about, no one to kill here, no one to instruct, no direction. She could only fish and garden so much, and the house's library had been set up for Edelgard's tastes, not hers.

She needed something to do.

Therefore, she set about creating perfect days for Edelgard. Picnics were easy, and only required some strategic consultation with the cook. Trips into town took some reconnaissance: people were curious about the ladies who'd moved into the big green house, and Edelgard did not want it getting around that the former Emperor was in the area.

Fortunately, people were less interested in than whether they were secretly Edelgard von Hresvelg and Byleth Eisner, and more interested in whether they were eligible. The story was that they were wealthy, they were married, and that they'd fought in the war many years ago, and that was that.

Outings to walk the forest outside the town were easy to plan. Outings to the circulating library, one of Ferdinand's ideas, were enjoyable. Outings to visit the sweet shop—Edelgard spent an astonishing amount of money even for her, and distributed the candies to a group of children waiting outside to see what the ladies looked like. The real challenge was in making it seem as though every suggestion Byleth made was spontaneous, rather than meticulously planned.

"I didn't expect you to take such an interest in town, my love," Edelgard said, rubbing down her horse one day after the ride back. "I'd hoped you'd like this place, but..."

"It's nice," Byleth said.

Byleth had traveled so much. This place didn't seem to be any different from any of the other sprawling, wealthy towns she'd stayed in, but for the fact thatEdelgard technically owned this one. She'd given up all her titles and most of her lands, but she'd kept this little sliver of a former barony to her name, for security. If this was hypocrisy, Byleth did not care. She had spent more than enough time with an empty stomach.

Once Byleth was comfortable with planning one perfect day per week, she increased her planning to two days. It was tiring, coming up with new and enjoyable things with such a limited palette. For half of her life, she had not even _enjoyed_ things.

 _Idiot girl! Enjoy your respite,_ Sothis would say. _How few people get to experience such a life of leisure after a life of war, don't be ungrateful. Give it time._

Sothis would have been right, of course. But Sothis wasn't here.

_*_

"Are you happy?" Edelgard asked one night, in the fourth month. They sat next to each other on the kitchen counter, hips and thighs touching, eating a fish-and-turnip stew the cook had left for them directly from the pot. It had gotten cold in the time it had taken them to come downstairs from the midday nap.

Byleth ducked her head down to eat the bite of fish on Edelgard's fork. When Edelgard protested, Byleth said, "Keep your reflexes sharp." 

"We're in no danger here," Edelgard replied, feeding Byleth a forkful of turnips. "We can be lax. If anyone in the Empire has earned it, we have." 

Byleth had nothing to say to that. 

"I'm having a wonderful time," Edelgard went on. "This is everything I've dreamed of for the past five years, and never thought I'd live to see. But, professor... I do wonder if _you_ can be happy like this."

"I have projects," Byleth said. 

She nuzzled at Edelgard's neck, and Edelgard's hand came up to hold her head there for a moment, then let her go. 

"Yes, your cabbages are coming along nicely, but you haven't answered my question. Is there anything you need? Anything at all, my love, I'll get it for you." 

Byleth set her fork aside. "I'm happy if I'm with you,." 

Edelgard hummed, and seemed satisfied. Byleth had been Edelgard's instrument for so long, and before that, she'd been her father's. Nothing had to change, not really. There was no need to voice her own feelings on the matter. 

\- 

On a rainy day in the Blue Sea Moon, six months after they'd moved in, the maid stuck her head into the little shed where Byleth dried fish to say, "Sir, there's gentlemen on the footpath, the lady has gone out to greet them." 

There were only two gentlemen in Adrestia who both knew where she and Edelgard were and were also bold enough to show up without announcing themselves in advance.

The rain had paused. The air smelled heavy and wet. When Byleth came out on the stoop to greet them, Edelgard and Hubert were facing one another in the middle of the lane that led up to their house. Ferdinand had paused a few feet back, adjusting his grip on their bags.

Hubert said something Byleth could not hear from this distance, and then bowed. Edelgard waved an imperious hand, and when Hubert straightened, looking bashful, she stepped forward and thrust her arms around him, holding him tight. He stood, awkward, unmoving, for a moment, and then he embraced her back, his hand going to her hair.

Ferdinand met Byleth's eyes, then edged around Edelgard and Hubert to get to the house. 

"We did send a letter, but the post can be unreliable this far from a city. Another improvement to be made!" Ferdinand said. Byleth tried to take one of the valises under his arm, but Ferdinand did not let her. His hair was pulled into a tight braid for traveling. He looked past her into the house, where the maid and cook were peeking around a pillar. "Do you think they've ever been apart for so long? Let's let them be."

"This is my friend Ferdinand," Byleth said to the staff. "My other friend Hubert is on the lane with El. I'm sorry for the short notice, but please ready the spare room."

"Anything you cook for dinner will be fine, Hubert hardly eats anyway!" Ferdinand said. "Yet _another_ improvement to be made."

The maid hurried forward to take his bags. Ferdinand insisted on carrying them himself. By the end of the short walk up the stairs, the girl had stars in her eyes, which Byleth understood to be a normal response to Ferdinand. She settled him in the sitting room with a pot of their nicest tea and went upstairs to see how the guest room looked. Byleth hadn't stepped foot in it since she and Edelgard had had sex on the bed. The maid was in the middle of putting fresh sheets on. They smelled like lavender, which Byleth couldn't remember having asked for.

"Sir," the maid said quietly, "Professor, sir, is that Duke Aegir?" 

"No," Byleth said. 

"I only ask because, well—I'd heard—I read in the papers, sir—that His Grace's given name was Ferdinand, and that he had quite a lot of red hair, as it's known the Aegirs do—"

"What a coincidence." Byleth looked the girl in the eyes. She was quite tall, and Byleth had to look up, but her stare had the desired effect. It was good to keep her hand in unnerving people, even if this was just a child, not a recalcitrant soldier. "Duke Aegir is not staying under this roof."

"Right, sir," the girl said, bobbing a hasty curtsy. "As you say."

There was still no sign of Edelgard and Hubert. Ferdinand was partially right: they hadn't been apart for so long since they were children. She'd had Edelgard all to herself for months, now, there was nothing to be jealous about. There never had been, with Hubert.

Cook turned out an even more beautiful dinner than usual for their guests, who were _absolutely_ not Count Vestra and Duke Aegir. Ferdinand and Edelgard carried the conversation along. The years had not made Hubert any more conversational, though they had mellowed him. He even laughed at a few of Ferdinand's jokes and stories, and he held Ferdinand's hand under the table when he was not pecking at his food.

When the meal was done, Edelgard pressed a kiss to Byleth's cheek. "Hubert and I need to discuss a few things," she said. "The new parliament—you understand. I'll be to bed shortly."

Across the table, Hubert had twisted the end of Ferdinand's long braid around his finger, and he tugged. "I thought it best to get matters of state out of the way at the beginning of the visit," he said.

"'Matters of state,'" Edelgard said. "Listen to yourself, Hubert."

"Very well. I find myself in need of your guidance—El," he said, and almost didn't stammer over her nickname. "I am used to working from the shadows. Your departure has thrust me into the light. Ferdinand cannot always be around to smooth the path for me."

Edelgard inclined her head, and the two of them retired to Edelgard's study. 

"I'm glad you've settled in so comfortably," Ferdinand said. "I thought I would never see the day Edelgard would stop, but here we are."

"Have you considered it?" Byleth asked.

"I couldn't imagine it. Do you know what they're calling me and Hubert? The Two Jewels of Adrestia."

"Yes. Because you're Edelgard's ballsack."

"Professor—no! Because we shine so brightly. It's _very_ complimentary." 

"I see," Byleth said.

Ferdinand was always pleasant to talk to. He had a lot to say about land management and the founding of schools. Listening to someone speak passionately on a subject she knew nothing about did not require her to speak, only to nod along and ask the occasional question.

After Ferdinand and Hubert retired to their room, and Edelgard took herself off to sleep, Byleth wandered the house. Having guests had transformed it, somehow. She caught herself looking at that painting, wondering what Ferdinand must have thought of it, and looked out a window and considered what Hubert must have thought of her traps in the woods. The maid had stayed late to see to Sir Ferdinand and Sir Hubert's' comfort, and she had her cloak and was passing Byleth on the stairwell when she paused and took a deep breath, presumably for courage.

"Beg pardon," said the maid. "I—I just had to ask. Of course I understand your friend Sir Ferdinand isn't Duke Aegir, but the lady... sir, is she the emperor?"

"Adrestia doesn't have an emperor."

" _Was_ she the emperor?"

"Yes."

"Oh." This seemed to throw the little maid off balance. "It's just, she's very...."

"Say what you mean to say, please."

"Kind," the maid said. "She pays a generous wage— _too_ generous—and sends me along with food for my siblings, she knows all their names, she offered to sponsor my younger sister to the academy at Garreg Mach, after she's hardly known me half a year—"

"She's just a person," Byleth said. 

The maid chewed her bottom lip. "And if she's Emperor Edelgard, that means you're—" 

"Just a person," Byleth repeated. Nothing more, and nothing less. 

-

The next morning, they went down to town together.

Byleth had planned yet another perfect day, down to the minute—a horseback ride along the river, a late afternoon picnic, an outing to the town's little bookstore to see what new paints the owner had gotten for Edelgard. Edelgard had been using Dagdan blue at an alarming rate, and Byleth had projected that she would run out of it in two weeks based on how much and how quickly she worked. And so she put a word in the owner's ear that her wife, a very profligate spender in town, might like a tube of it. It took a week and a half to come from the capital, and two days to get onto the shelves. Edelgard had run out of it yesterday and had been lamenting it over breakfast before Ferdinand and Hubert's arrival. When they went to the shop today, she would have a fortuitous discovery of precisely what she needed.

Then, they'd watch the sunset on the way back. Someone else would suggest this, because Byleth's reconnaissance showed that the river reflected the setting sun to great advantage as they traveled westward back to town.

It was no struggle to add Ferdinand and Hubert to her plans. They were, as always, glad to follow her lead. If Byleth did not look too closely at the situation, it felt as though the four of them had never been separated. But they had been, and everything was different now.

Ferdinand chattered the entire ride, giving them the news from Enbarr, which they had not quite gotten to last night:

Dorothea had premiered a new opera, _The Falcon Knight's Bride_ , and had starred in one special performance as Empress Iris von Hresvelg. Bernadetta, the Bear of Varley, who'd relinquished her title and lands as soon as she could, had been induced to leave her townhouse to go to one single party Ferdinand threw. It had been declared the best of the season as a result. Queen Petra of Brigid and the Premier of Morfis were on their way for a diplomatic visit.

The day proceeded correctly. But by the time Ferdinand suggested watching the sunrise by the river—as planned—Hubert was casting strange glances at her. Edelgard and Ferdinand had taken off their boots to skip rocks in the shallows, leaving Byleth and Hubert behind.

"What a wonderful day," Hubert said, in insinuating tones.

Byleth looked out over the river. The sunset was orange and dull blue tonight, with purple in the far distance. Sometimes, she resented the way Rhea had taken her from her old life as as a mercenary and thrust her into this world, but the Ashen Demon had never simply appreciated a nice evening. The Ashen Demon could not have imagined the simple peace that watching her wife kick water at someone would have brought her.

"It felt familiar—almost nostalgic, really," Hubert went on.

"I'm glad."

"Why, it was as though you and I were on the battlefield once again. When you pointed to the bookshop, I had the overwhelming sense that you were advancing your troops and getting ready to order me to flank an enemy mage."

There was no need to respond to Hubert's observations. It was enough to lay back on the riverbank with him and meet his eyes. The two of them had never needed to speak much in order to understand one another. He'd taken off his coat and rolled his sleeves up to his elbows, and he lay back on the soft grass. Even this spot was ideal: the grass was green, and getting greener with all the rain they'd been having for the past few weeks.

"The day was planned," Byleth admitted, once they'd lain in peace for a while. "With rigor."

"Her Majesty— _El,_ I mean." Hubert cleared his throat and played with one of his neatly pressed cuffs. "She loves you, Professor. You don't need to try so hard."

Down by the river, Ferdinand climbed onto a boulder and made an impassioned, half-joking speech about his superior technique, and Edelgard laughed when he nearly slid off of it. The two of them had come so far. Byleth was proud of them.

"I'd hoped she wouldn't notice," Byleth said.

"She will," Hubert replied. "If something is making you wish to play the general again, you had ought to address it sooner rather than later, don't you think?"

Byleth nodded. When it came to Edelgard, Hubert spoke sense. 

"Professor," Ferdinand cried from the riverbank, "we have reached the finals of our tournament! Please, come judge who among us is the worthiest skipper of stones!" 

Edelgard and Ferdinand both had their hands sternly on their hips. Both of them had fallen into the water at some point, and the result was that Edelgard's pink dress clung fetchingly to her body.

"I can do that," Byleth said.

"Good!" Ferdinand said. "Hubert, come along too! Edelgard has had years to corrupt our honest professor with her wiles, we will need an impartial observer!"

"Very well," Hubert said, pulling himself up from the ground with a sly, secret smile on his face. "I can find it in my heart to do so." 

Byleth accepted Hubert's help standing up. They descended down the hill arm in arm, old comrades, now more.

\- 

Hubert and Ferdinand stayed for six more days, and left on a sunny morning. The cook, who was quite taken with Sir Ferdinand's appreciation for her teamaking skills, sent them off with one of her picnic baskets for the journey. 

"How nice," Edelgard said, once their horses were out of sight. "Perhaps we can get Dorothea to visit us next, or Petra... what do you think, my love?" 

Byleth nodded. Hubert's words had been sitting like a rock in the bottom of her gut. "I think that would be nice."

" _Do_ you?" Edelgard said. "If you'd rather it be just us out here, I'd be glad for that, as well. We needn't see anyone you don't want to. I know it's always been difficult for you—being around people."

"It's fine."

They went back into the house. The maid and the cook had worked early in the morning and were gone already, and it was quiet but for the rushing on the wind in the trees outside. They went to the sitting room, where Edelgard had her easel set up in the window facing Byleth's garden. Byleth took the chaise, and picked up the book she'd been reading before Hubert and Ferdinand's visit. It was about mercenaries in the time of the Almyran invasion, and while it was obvious that the author had never picked up a weapon in her life, the descriptions of the long marches were very good.

"It's only," Edelgard said, as though the conversation had never stopped, "Hubert spoke to Ferdinand, who in turn spoke to me." 

At this, Byleth had a thought unbefitting of the new age of peace and tranquility she'd helped usher in.

"They said you seemed a bit... dissatisfied, to them," Edelgard continued. She daubed her paintbrush in some color and considered her canvas. "I admit that I do miss Enbarr, but if you're truly miserable—"

"El, I'm happy just to be with you," Byleth said. 

Edelgard's back went very straight in the chair. "We've been over this. You are not the mere vessel Rhea wished to make of you. You have wants of your own, and we have been together far too long for you to pretend this is not the case." 

"Hmm."

Byleth set her book down in her lap. When Edelgard was irritated—when she put on the emperor voice—there was no strategizing your way out of it.

"I've been planning my abdication for five years, and planning our move to this house for the past year." Now Edelgard turned around, and she looked _hurt_ , not angry. "At any point, you could have said something. We could have moved into town, or gone to the Dukedom, or to gone to Derdriu. No doors are closed to us."

"It's difficult," Byleth said, "to say what I want. Sometimes... I fall into old habits."

The wind came out of Edelgard's sails a bit, at that. "You do," Edelgard replied, "and so do I."

"You were very excited about the house." 

"And I can be difficult to say no to." 

"It's not a burden. I like it when you're excited." 

"You can't get out of this conversation with innuendos, my teacher," Edelgard said, but her gaze dipped downward to the open buttons of Byleth's shirt. That was promising. 

Still, this was their life now, and Edelgard deserved a real conversation. She deserved everything. 

"I need something to do," Byleth said. "Something to plan. Winter will come, and I'll have no garden. We can't get involved in local politics, and there aren't any wars. There aren't even any bandits in the area."

Yet. Maybe the cold weather would bring some, and she could get a bit of exercise—orshe could find out why they'd become bandits and fix it. Or both.

Edelgard rearranged her dress about her ankles. "I have an idea... it will sound ridiculous." 

"It might, but I've never laughed at you before."

"Very well. I have been thinking, and I would like a baby," Edelgard said. "Our friends working on a cure, they're so near to it, and I'll have so much more time than I ever thought I would. I want a child of my own to see this world we've made. A child of _our_ own."

"Can magic do that?" Byleth asked, stroking her chin. Constance would surely know about this kind of thing.

"No, I suppose we'll need assistance."

"All right. I'll send for Hubert. He can't be more than a few miles away on horseback."

"Professor! Not right at this moment. In the future. But please, don't go along with something else just for my sake. Do _you_ want this?"

"I was never a child," said Byleth. "I never had a home. I didn't laugh, cry, or play. My father put a sword in my hand and taught me to fight. You didn't get to be a child for very long, either."

"No," Edelgard replied, "I did not."

Edelgard set aside her pallet and came to sit next to Byleth on the chaise. She wrapped her strong arms around Byleth's waist, and Byleth held her close. _She's just a person_ , Byleth had said to the maid. Neither of them really knew what they were doing in this world. It had no use for them anymore. A child with Edelgard's beautiful eyes, Edelgard's stubborn chin, who would grow up without fear or want, who'd never have to pick up sword or axe if it did not care for fighting, whose Crest or lack thereof would not matter at all to her parents... the silence stretched a bit too long while Byleth thought, and Edelgard's arms tightened. 

"It's something to consider," Byleth said. "I understand now why we have a third and fourth bedroom in this house. I just thought they'd accidentally made too many."

"My love, that isn't how houses work," Edelgard said patiently. 

"I believe you." Byleth lay down on her side and took Edelgard with her, so that they were pressed front-to-front. Edelgard made a very pleased noise from around the region of Byleth's chest. "I'm an able combat instructor, but we'd need to arrange for other tutors. And to get a fence that it can't crawl beneath. And to review the garden for plants that it can't eat."

"Yes," Edelgard said. "We'll need to do all of that."

"Ferdinand could help us pick an appropriate pony for its first riding lessons. And we'd need appropriate books." Her novel had slid to the floor at some point. The long, lovingly detailed passages about soldiers oiling one another's weapons were not suitable for a child, probably.

"Of course."

"Not to mention—"

Edelgard pushed herself up on her elbow and smiled down at Byleth. "I'm glad you're considering it," she said. "But you see how things are between us: I express a desire, and you are willing to move the world to fulfill it, without question or complaint. Allow me to do the same for you. We've accomplished the impossible, and we have nothing to strive for now but our own happiness. Neither of us should set our own aside for the other's sake. Just walk with me, by my side, my teacher."

"Very well," Byleth said. It really was that simple, wasn't it. "Our neighbor to the south will be raising a new barn next week. I'd like to go offer our help. And my fish drying shed"—which Byleth had erected herself, and which Edelgard never, ever wanted to step inside of—"needs expansion before winter."

"Anything," Edelgard replied.

"Hmm." Byleth tugged Edelgard back to her, and Edelgard let out a low, huffing laugh. "I've got another project in mind, if you're interested in my proposition."

"I will hear your petition," Edelgard said, and climbed atop Byleth.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find your pal PD on twitter a @[a_printersdevil](https://twitter.com/a_printersdevil).


End file.
